


When Ghosts Return to Haunt Us

by stopwatch_plz (immiscibility)



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: FrostIron - Freeform, Gen, M/M, Poor Tony, Slow Burn, What Could Possibly Go Wrong?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-10-25
Updated: 2016-02-26
Packaged: 2018-02-22 13:42:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 16,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2509847
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/immiscibility/pseuds/stopwatch_plz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Summer, 1985, Long Beach USA - 15 year old Tony Stark is hating pretty much everything and everyone, and envisions the summer being long and lonely before he's shipped off to MIT that Fall. However, what happens is wildly out of his expectations when a stranger (literally) crash lands into his life.  Things don't always go the way you want them to though, and the expectations and demands of others can sometimes leave you forgetting what you didn't remember in the first place. </p><p>But memories have a funny habit of sneaking up on you when you least expect it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In the beginning...

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first planned WIP fic ever, which comes out of the idea I had planned for this year's MarvelBang but didn't get to complete on time for various reasons. After having done so much work on it, I decided to convert it into an episodic fic on here.   
> The story will be a two part canon-AU; the first set many years before The Avengers, and the second part from the end of the film. 
> 
> I suppose this could be sub-titled "What if... Tony and Loki had actually met before actually meeting."  
> ;-)

**Summer, 1985; Long Beach, USA**

 

_There was something his brain was trying to tell him, something important, something that he needed to know. He felt as if he were at the bottom of a great lake, dark and fathomless, and only with great effort was he able to swim up towards the light at the top of the water..._

Loki opened his eyes with a start, instinctively on guard, and while his mind tried to catch up with itself he pushed himself to a seated position and grimaced at the sharp pain that shot through him. Looking down he saw material torn and covered in blood from an open wound on his leg - broken, apparently - and he sat on the sand, slightly dazed and uncomfortably confused as recent memories came back to him. It seemed only a few moments ago he been on Asgard, searching in the outlying wastes of the city for a rare plant he had read about in a recently-acquired book on alchemic constructs. He remembered seeing what he thought was the tell-tale golden flowers of the _Aurumia_ plant, remembered reaching down to get a closer look at it...

Then remembered the ground opening up, darkness yawning beneath him, and the feeling of being pulled in, powerless to resist.

And now, here he was - alone and injured - in an unknown area of what he was rather disappointed to realise was Midgard. Wondering if this was some kind of retribution for his past disdain of the planet and it’s inhabitants, Loki sighed quietly as he realised his first action had to be to find some kind of shelter, where he could be left in peace to heal and recover his magic. Although he was confident that nothing on the planet could kill him, or even cause any significant injury, being caught out in the open in unknown territory while injured was not something he wished to put to the test. Getting to his feet carefully, he pushed the pain aside in his mind and set off towards the horizon, where he could see a cluster of low buildings which seemed to be abandoned. 

At least there was something still on his side, he thought to himself with a sigh.

...

Tony sighed and scuffed the toe of his shoe along the dirt as he walked down the road, the afternoon sun warm with the arrival of summer and a thin film of sweat was starting to cover his arms and legs. It had been a good start to the day - well, as close as to good as it could get - and then he just had to open his mouth to talk back to his dad. He’d known it was a stupid thing to do and yet he just couldn’t help himself when faced with the tirade thrown against him; his dad always managed to pick up on the smallest thing he did wrong and somehow turn it into the biggest disappointment possible. Nothing Tony did ever seemed to satisfy the great and wonderful Howard Stark, and standing up for himself only served to make his mother unhappy, her face dropping into a hated expression of disappointment tinged with resignation. Unable to stay under the same roof as them, Tony had picked up his bag and run out, away from the overbearing atmosphere he had managed to create even before midday.. At least he wouldn’t have to put up with it much longer - he was being packed off to MIT in the fall and he couldn’t wait to get away from his parents and the oppressive atmosphere that seemed to permeate the walls. 

He blinked and came back to himself with a start and he looked around with surprise; his feet had brought him to his secret hideout without even realising it. The place was little more than a glorified shack he had found on one of his regular explorations trying to escape his life and, so far, it hadn’t been discovered. He had taken to filling it with bits and pieces that he’d found and acquired, turning it into his own little workshop, where he could spend time doing what he wanted rather than being told what to do or worrying that his dad would tell him he was wasting his time or doing something pointless. He scowled angrily as he felt anger well up inside him and he walked up to the door heavily, letting it swing close behind. Looking up, in the gloom from the sunlight coming through the gaps in the walls and doors, he felt a welcome sense of security when he saw the piles of materials in front of him. Tony could hear the sound of the sea nearby, the regular sound of the waves beginning to calm him, and he walked further into the room . 

And jumped in surprise when suddenly he saw the twin-glare of two green eyes staring at him through the darkness.

“Shit!”, Tony swore as he stepped backwards in surprise, almost tripping over a box full of spare _things_ he’d been collecting over the last few months. He blinked as he saw a pale face looking at him, and in his shock he almost turned to run - except something gave him reason to stay and take in the invader of his space. The man was thin, eyes sunken and surrounded with what looked like dark bruises, and wearing a uniform of some kind. Tony realised that, even despite their obvious height and age difference, he could probably best the man in a fight and he felt the surprise and shock fade away to be replaced with curiosity.

“Umm, hi?” Tony asked after a moment, still moving forwards, making sure not to appear threatening. “You ok?” He saw the man blink as his eyes focussed slowly, then he sighed softly.

“No, I don’t think I am.”

His voice was cool and crisp, with an accent that Tony couldn’t place it at all, and it was only as he got closer that he saw the tear in the man’s leg, through whatever material his pants were made of, and pale skin stained with dark blood. Tony’s eyes went wide.” Oh god, you gotta get to a hospital!”

“No!” 

Tony visibly jumped with surprise at the forcefulness behind the word, his eyes open wide as the man spoke again.

“I will be fine, just... I will rest here for a few days and then be on my way.” 

Tony looked at him and shrugged. “It’s ok with me - there’s not many people live round here so you won’t be disturbed. Just don’t touch my stuff!” he added on the end quickly as he saw the man look around the room as if seeing his workspace for the first time.

“And what is your “stuff” for?” 

“Umm... things,” Tony replied vaguely, then added, “I make whatever I feel like making.” He saw he had the other’s attention and continued. “I’m trying to build a spatially-aware robot, that can sense when it’s approaching an immovable object and automatically adjust its trajectory...” he said as his eyes focused on the nearest surface.

“But?”

He sighed. “But I can’t seem to get the sensor working properly and it’s frustrating me!” he said in annoyance as he stared at the pieces on the desk. “It’s meant to be easy and I can’t even do that right” Tony said angrily - then he sighed loudly and flopped down in a nearby chair, his surprise at his unexpected guest suddenly gone. “Everything sucks, “ he muttered in a low voice.

“Everything?” 

“Everything,” Tony confirmed as he began to fiddle with a piece of machinery on the table next to him and spoke, eyes still on his hands, starting to feel nervous with a stranger in what should be his personal space. “So, umm... what’s your name?”

“Loki.” He could see no reason to lie to the boy, after all.

Tony looked up, curious. “That’s a weird name,” he said without thinking, then he bit his lip. “Uh, what I meant was... umm..”

“Then it’s just as well it’s not your name,” Loki replied with a small smile, despite his exhaustion and pain,and the boy returned it with a nervous grin.

“Well, Loki - I’m Tony. _Never_ Anthony, ok?” he added almost as an afterthought. Only his parents called him Anthony, and usually only when he’d done something wrong. It never felt like his name. 

“Pleased to make your acquaintance, Tony.”

Tony was about to reply then caught the reading on the face of the watch he was wearing. Swearing loudly he hauled himself out of the chair and sighed. “I’ve gotta get back home now, my parents will kill me if I miss dinner. We’ve got some visitors from somewhere I don’t really care about and would be happy to miss it to be honest but...” Tony went to leave and then stopped and turned back. “Is there anything I can bring you?” he asked and the other man looked thoughtful.

“I would appreciate some food - fruit, and bread if you have it. And a blanket would be much appreciated.” He got a nod in reply.

“I’ll see what I can do,” came the response, and in a second he was gone, the place suddenly silent but for the quiet sound of breathing, like the calm after a storm. Loki sat in silence, his thoughts racing as he assessed his situation. He could feel his magic working within him, fixing all that was broken or damaged, but it was sluggish and slow, as if something was interrupting it’s flow. It would take him a while to regain full strength, and that was even before he could think about how he could get back to Asgard.

With a sigh, he let himself stretch out on the couch and let sleep overtake him.


	2. Of Myths and Monsters

Loki felt rather relieved when Tony returned around the same time the next day, a rucksack slung over one shoulder and a grin on his face.

“Heya!” Tony shouted as he barged through the door, and grinned even wider at the rather undignified noise Loki made at his unexpected arrival.

“Sorry,” he grinned, his tone in opposition to his words, and Loki scowled slightly as Tony dropped two bags on the floor with a thud. “I managed to grab some things - nothing too fancy, just a loaf of bread and cheese, and some fruit...” 

He barely let Tony finish before all but pouncing on the bag, grabbing some bread and a bit of cheese in each hand and stuffing them into his mouth without a word. He hadn’t realised just how hungry he was, which was probably the reason his magic wasn’t working as fast as he’d expect. As he ate, he could feel energy start to build within him and he stopped only to sigh contentedly, eyes half-closed.

“So, umm... where are you from?” Tony asked, curiosity overwhelming all other emotions. The voice in the back of his head kept coming up with annoying questions, like shouldn’t he be more wary of a random guy turning up from nowhere, but he’d learnt to ignore the voice a long time ago. Plus the guy seemed more interested in eating the food than him.

A myriad of emotions ran through Loki’s mind at the question. It wasn’t unusual for Asgardians to visit Midgard - they had been doing so for centuries now - but usually such visits were done without revealing their true origin. However, Loki had not been intending to end up here, and had no plans to stay - in fact, he wanted to return home as soon as possible. Thor would be increasingly concerned with his unexpected disappearance, as any brother would, not to mention his parents. 

“I am Loki Odinsson, Prince Regent of Asgard, second son to Odin All-father and Queen Frigga.”

He scowled slightly at the deafening silence that met him, though in truth he had not been expecting anything more if he were honest. Midgardians were one of the most ignorant of the Nine Realms to the true origin of their world, blind to the Tree of Life and it’s importance to them all. Really, he’d had no interest in anything to do with Midgard over the years, his visits few and far between, instead satisfying himself with what he read in his studies. Regardless, Loki sighed and decided to give Tony a small history of the origins of his - and other - worlds.

 

An hour later, Tony was staring at him as though he had suddenly grown horns. Loki was actually quite impressed by the way the boy had taken it all in - he was obviously very confused and slightly sceptical, but he sat and listened to Loki in an engaged manner, only interrupting occasionally with intelligent and well thought-out questions. Loki soon realised that he was rather enjoying himself - usually it was impossible to teach anyone anything in Asgard that didn’t involve combat or drinking, or storytelling about the same. Something made him think that this boy was different, especially on Midgard where most of them wouldn’t even consider the truth of what he was saying, let alone process the information and respond with relevant queries and comments.

“So, you’re saying that this is just one of a number of other places under the charge of this Asgard - where you’re from - who work to stop things going wrong and prevent everything going boom?”

Loki winced visibly at the crude words, but nodded regardless. “It is rather more... complex than that but, yes.” He saw Tony grin and rolled his eyes slightly, which didn’t seem to dampen the boy’s enthusiasm.

“So... you’re an alien prince from outer space, got it.” Tony moved to sit on the seat next to Loki, and his brows furrowed in curiosity. “But next question then - how did you get here? And why?” 

It was inevitable that these questions were coming, but he was still at a loss as to the answer. Logically, travel between the Worlds was impossible without the Bifrost, the gate manned by Heimdall the all-seer himself. It was impossible to travel the Paths without it....

And yet, he had managed it.

Loki turned towards Tony, his eyes clear and bright. “I have no idea, “ he replied, truthfully.

...

Tony didn’t come back the next day, and by the following morning Loki found himself starting to worry. He sent a questioning wave of magic through him, small enough not to take up much energy, and he was glad to have it confirmed that he was well on the way to full recovery. His leg had been healing well, but he knew he would be unable to travel far on it, and although he had rationed the food brought for him earlier, he was down to a couple of apples - and one can of the rather alarmingly sweet drink he had reliably been informed was ‘soda’ - which was not enough to sustain him for long, especially injured as he was. Loki considered his options; finding another on this forsaken planet as accepting as the boy was fairly unlikely, and he at least had shelter and some warmth here. The uncertainty swayed it for him - he wasn’t as familiar with Midgard as he was with the other realms, and he could end up in a much worse situation than he currently found himself in. 

He was rewarded later that day, just as the sun was starting to fade. Loki had been sitting on the small bench, deep in thought, and jumped in surprise yet again when the door flew open and Tony barreled in.

“Sorry I couldn’t come yesterday!” he said with a grimace. “I had to study all day then dad made me go to the office.” His expression clouded further. “Not that I did anything anyway - dad never lets me, despite knowing more than any of the idiots there.” Tony threw his duffel down on the floor and sighed loudly.

“What does your father do?” Loki asked, trying to be polite and not show just how much he hoped that the bag on the floor contained more food.

“Apart from get drunk and shout at lot?” Tony snarked then sighed. “You must really be from another planet not to know of the Great and Wonderful Howard Stark. He owns one of the biggest technology companies in the country, specialising in military contracts. Everyone loves him, calls him a genius, one of the ‘best inventors of this age’...”

“And you?” Loki asked after a few moments, hearing the resentment curdling the boy’s voice.

Tony looked away, a myriad of expressions playing out on his face, finally settling on anger. “I think he’s a controlling ass who cares more about how I make him look, rather than how I feel.” There was a moments silence before he snorted wrly “Not that it matters what the hell I think,” he added as he sat down at his workbench and started fiddling with the machinery.

Loki looked at Tony, all thought of food momentarily gone as he saw the look on the boy’s face. Anger, hurt, loneliness - the emotions were as easy to read as words in a book, and Loki felt himself feel a strange kind of sympathy, something that would have made him scoff at before, but now... after the openness Tony had shown him he found it hard to feel any sense of resentment. Standing up from where he had been sitting, Loki walked to where Tony was and sat down next to the boy, who looked up at him in surprise.

“Let me,” Loki said as he took the small robot from Tony’s hands and close his eyes, sending his magic into the machine. Midgard was far behind Asgard in their technology in many ways, but he was impressed at what he found when he looked - and was pleased when he found the fault. Quickly correcting it, he smiled as he opened his eyes to see Tony staring at him closely. “There,” he said, without much fanfare, and he got a sceptical look in reply as Tony started hooking it up to the old computer there, a machine stripped to nothing but the bare essentials for the work he did. Firing it up, he opened the program and checked the code in confusion.

“What the- I can see something’s been changed but none of this makes sense!” he said, both confused and frustrated. “What did you do?”

“Just set it a task,” Loki replied, to which Tony glanced sideways and raised an eyebrow but said nothing, and with a few more keystrokes Tony disconnected the machine and set it on the floor, turning the power switch on as he did. He waited a few moments as it woke up then he watched it set off across the floor, trundling on it’s runners in a straight line.. 

“...and this is where it smacks straight into the wall,” Tony muttered, and Loki smiled.

“Patience.”

They both watched the small machine approach the wall, and it seemed not to slow down or make any movement at all. Tony was halfway towards saying ‘told you so’ when it suddenly swerved sideways, missing the wall by millimetres and rolled happily onwards to the next obstacle, a table leg, where it proceeded to do exactly the same thing. With a string of curses Loki didn’t understand but nonetheless thought impressive, Tony pushed himself off the bench and ran after the machine, picking it up gently as he looked back.

“How did you... I mean, what did you do?” he spluttered, unable to contain his confusion and surprise. He had almost driven himself crazy spending weeks going over the code for the machine but being unable to find the bug and now... 

Loki smiled. “Your technology is not too different to ours, but we also have another tool at hand - that which you would call ‘magic’ - which is very compatible. In Asgard we have been using the two combined for many years making what seems impossible to you, possible to us.”

Tony scowled as he made his way back to the workbench and set the robot down carefully on the worktop. “Are you really trying to convince me that such a thing exists?” he said, his voice full of suspicion and disbelief, sure that he was trying to be taken as a fool. He had never been a gullible person, demanding facts and figures to back up his beliefs and reasoning.

“You’re willing to accept I am royalty from what is essentially another dimension, yet not that I know magic?” Loki asked with a raised eyebrow. While Midgard was considered to be home some of the more advanced thinkers of the Realms in terms of intellectual pursuits, its inhabitants were mostly still lacking in the ability to consider anything beyond their blinkered limitations.

“I guess you’re right,” Tony said with a sheepish grin, “but it’s just so weird. I mean... technology is easy to understand, it’s all there, you just need to learn what bits to put together how to make which outcome. Magic is just... I dunno.”

Loki smiled and held out his hands. “It’s very similar, in a way - there are different types of magic, and each person has their own style, but it all comes down to theory. Not anyone can work magic though, and even those with the talent have many years of study to go through before they can be considered even proficient, unless they are a natural at it - though natural mages are rare, even is Asgard. Especially male ones...” he trailed off subconsciously, staring into the distance until he frowned and shook his head gently. “But that is of no relevance,” he added softly with a small smile.

The expression hadn’t gone unnoticed by Tony, but he decided to pass it by in favour of asking more interesting questions. “How do you know if someone has the talent for magic?” he asked. “Is there like a test you have to do or something?” The whole idea that there could be something out there that he didn’t even know existed made his mind race.

“It’s very easy,” Loki replied. “You just have to look inside a person - here, give me your hands.” He shifted sideways on the bench and after a moment Tony copied.

“You’re not going to brainwash me or turn me into an evil puppet of myself, are you?” Tony asked, only half seriously, and he sighed inwardly when Loki snorted with amusement.

“No, fear not, precious mortal - I don’t have enough power left for that, even if that were my plan. Which it isn’t.” he added quickly as he took Tony’s hands in his and closed his eyes. “Magic follows paths in the body, like ley lines. To access these paths the gates need to be opened, as it were. To do so, I would send my magic into the other person, locate the barriers and... oh!” 

Tony jumped in surprise at the exclamation. “What? What’s going on? What have you found? what-”

“Quiet!” 

Loki’s voice was loud and clear and gave no room for disobedience. For the first time in possibly his entire life, Tony followed the command without question and resisted the urge to pull back his hands, which were now held in a tight grip. He saw the look of concentration on Loki’s face, eyes close, forehead wrinkled and beaded with sweat, and he decided it was all too weird - until he felt what seemed like a rush of cool water inside him, starting from his hands and flowing through his body. It was strange, but not unpleasant, and for a moment he was caught up in the feeling, coming back to the present only when he felt his hands being released. Opening his eyes he looked at the other man curiously.

“What the hell was that?”

Loki looked up at him with a strange expression on his face, a mixture of confusion and amazement as he spoke, his voice quiet but loud in the deafening silence.

“ _You have magic._ ”


	3. All Good Things Must End

The time passed without either of them really paying much attention to it, so focussed they were on the new discovery. For the next few days, Loki made Tony go through a whole number of tasks and experiments, over and over, until Tony started whining and Loki let him get back to fiddling with his machines and he could be left in peace to work out what was going on. There hadn’t been any record of a Midgardian naturally possessing magic in many years and yet, here they were. The magic reserve in Tony wasn’t small either; he had noticed it almost immediately, just waiting there, pulsing away like a heartbeat, getting stronger and stronger with each second. 

It was something Loki couldn’t ignore, to find something so remarkable... no, he would not let this go to waste, despite his hesitations . He was well aware that allowing a mortal, of all people, access to magical knowledge from other Realms would be seen as a breach of trust, even as treason, but none of this was at the front of Loki’s mind at this moment All he could think about was that he would have someone to teach, a pupil, willing at that, to share his knowledge with, and that he would have a companion that _understood_ \- something which he was sorely lacking on Asgard. He looked over from the couch he was seated on and watched the boy work for a while, nimble fingers seeming to glide over the components, driven by intuition and desire, creating something out of nothing, and Loki lost himself for a while in his thoughts.

“Fuck!” Tony swore as he jumped in his seat and shook his hand which was smoking slightly. “The hell was that?” he scowled angrily as he peered at the offending item.

“Is everything alright?” Loki enquired as he stood up and walked over to Tony, sitting down beside the boy and staring at him curiously. He saw Tony flinch then look away.

“Yeah, I just... I think I manage to burn this circuit board out. Again.” Tony sighed as he surveyed the still-smoking wreckage on the table.

“You’re trying too hard. Magic is not a thing to be overpowered and tamed. It is a creature to nourish and encourage - it learns from you as much as you learn from it. Here,” Loki stood behind Tony and took a hand in each of his. “Close your eyes and concentrate on what you feel.”

What Tony could feel the most was the man’s chest pressed up against his back, and a strange feeling of awkwardness that he nonetheless didn’t want to move away from, but he said nothing and did as he was told. Closing his eyes he tried to block out his surroundings and was surprised when he felt what he knew Loki had been talking about. It felt like a river running through him, clear and cool, and he felt himself smile as he thought about stepping in to join the flow. A second later he felt Loki jump behind him, then huff a small laugh onto the back of his neck, which made Tony shiver in a strangely pleasant way, as he felt a different magic join in. The image of red and fire entwined filled his mind and he gave a small gasp/

“That is magic, Tony.” he heard Loki whisper behind him.

...

When it came it was so unexpected that, initially, Loki hadn’t been sure at first. 

The two of them were working together, as they had been doing for days beforehand. Summer was in full swing, and Loki spent half the time grumbling about the heat, to the point that Tony brought an ice cooler with him one day, filled with bottles of water, and Loki was just twisting the cap off of one when he felt it. He froze mid-action, totally unaware of Tony looking at him worriedly, and hardly registered when he dropped the bottle from his hand. Diving to catch it, Tony fell hard on his shoulder and gasped as the wind was knocked out of him. The movement broke Loki from his trance and he looked down at Tony, who was still trying to catch his breath.

“What the hell?” Tony swore, annoyed. “There’s electrics in here! You can’t throw water aro- hey, you’re white as a sheet! What’s wrong?”

Loki blinked, and seemed to finally focus on Tony as he took a deep breath and let it out slowly, trying not to let his emotions show in his voice as he replied.

“Heimdall.”

“What?”

“Who!”

“Who what?”

“Who wh- ugh, stop it!” Loki shouted as he clenched his hands into fists and looked like he was about to either explode or cry. Tony kinda hoped neither was going to happen, being rather lacking in the that department, and he was just wondering what he should do know when Loki spoke.

“Heimdall. I told you about him - he is the Gatekeeper of Asgard who mans the Bifrost. None can enter or leave Asgard except through him and the rainbow bridge... normally.” Loki added, his voice quiet and almost distant. “It appears he has finally seen me, and has commanded me to return home under orders from my father via the Bifrost portal site...”

“Which is where?”

“Does it matter?” Loki shot back angrily, and Tony flinched as he saw the man in front of him go through a sudden and drastic transformation. “Can you see what is happening? The moment I start to find a place where I feel I belong in this universe he digs his claws in and drags me back!” Loki was all but shouting now and began to pace round the room, and he barely registered as Tony unconsciously took a few steps away from him. “It is always the case that when I begin to feel like there is someone who will accept me, who understands me, Father takes them away from me! What have I ever done to him...” Loki stopped as he stared angrily at Tony, then the light fell from his eyes and he dropped onto the nearby couch and he spoke again, this time barely more than a whisper. “What have I ever done to him?”

Tony frowned slightly. At least this was a topic he was much more able to deal with - talking about shitty fathers should’ve been his final year paper. Leaning against a nearby table he finally replied. “Why don’t you stay here?”

Loki looked up, his eyes wet with unshed tears of anger, and he furrowed his brow. “What do you mean?”

“Do you have to do as he says? Why not hang around here for a while!”

He watched as Loki raised his eyebrow in disbelief. “And refuse a direct order from the All-father? But no, that isn’t even half the trouble I am in... What I neglected to inform you is that the teaching of magic is expressly forbidden to those on Midgard - and can, in the most serious of instances, be considered treason.” Loki looked up at Tony with a half smile that didn’t touch his eyes. “The current penalty for those convicted of treason is death.”

There was a silence that seemed to stretch forever, and time seemed to stand still - until Tony suddenly exploded.

“Death? What the fuck... seriously? You really think your father would kill you for teaching me what you have - which, in your own admission, isn’t very much? That’s bullshit!” Tony strode angrily to where Loki was sitting, hunched in on himself and taking up even less space than usual, and Tony sat down beside him. “I won’t let it!” Tony said with an air of finality.

“Oh Tony, I wish you could. I wish a lot of things - most of all that I didn’t have to do this.”

“Do wha-”

Tony’s words were cut off mid-sentence as Loki reached up quickly to hold the boy’s head, one hand on either side of his face, and Loki closed his eyes. Instantly Tony’s muscles went slack, and it looked for all concerned that he was sleeping, only Loki’s quiet muttering breaking the illusion. After a couple of minutes, he opened his eyes to look at Tony, who was still looking peaceful and calm and he sat for a few moments before standing up abruptly.

“I am sorry, Tony,” Loki said quietly as he turned and headed towards the exit, pausing before he opened it but refusing to glance back. He opened the door to leave but instead hesitated, eyes distant, before sighing softly and removing a gold bracelet from his wrist, slightly tarnished but still brightly coloured. Loki stared at the low table by the door and slowly, as if unsure of his actions, he reached out and placed the bracelet on top of a pile of scribbled, illegible notes. Taking a deep breath and scowling slightly at such a ridiculous show of sentimentality Loki straightened his back and, without looking back, slipped out into the oncoming night as the door closed behind him with a soft thud.

...

“Ow!” Tony grumbled as he woke up, his neck sore from the odd angle he had been lying at. With surprise he noticed that the sun had gone down - a few hours earlier, by his guess - and he knew his parents would be mad at him for being out late. Again. He stretched noisily as he got to his feet, grabbing his backpack as he headed towards the door, but just as he reached out towards the door handle something on the table next to him caught his eye, glinting in the dim light. He reached out and picked up a golden bracelet, tarnished and old-looking and very out of place. 

“Weird...” he muttered, as he picked it up, feeling the weight in his hand. “Where the hell did this come from?” Tony stared at it a bit longer then shrugged and slipped the bracelet into his pocket as he left, turning the lights off as he did so. He had another week of being able to come down here, then he was off to MIT and could forget about everything here, finally.


	4. Time Waits for No Man - or God

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 2013: New York is finally safe, yet again. The alien invasion stopped, and normality has resumed - for most people.
> 
> For two in particular though, things are about to get even more complicated.

**Fall 2013 (Midgardian time); Prison wing, Asgard**

Time for a near-immortal being went slowly. Time for a near-immortal being stuck in a glorified cage ten foot square went practically backwards. Loki sat on the floor, back straight against the wall, outwardly exuding an air of calm, controlled indifference. Inside, however...

Inside his thoughts were churning.

He had been incarcerated for too long now, the feeling of having his wings clipped turned into a physical sensation of crawling under his skin. He wanted to scream, to shout, to wreak havoc and mayhem, to rip and tear apart everyone and everything that got in his way; to cleave great rifts in the fabric of time and space itself and laugh as it all fell apart. Instead he was caged, chained and castrated - magically speaking, at least. The fetters he wore were attuned to his own personal magical signature, specifically for the purpose of removing his magic from him, and apparently made a number of years ago - and that had been their only mistake. The chains had been made many years ago, when Loki’s magic was weaker and untainted by the touch of the Tesseract and his actions in New York. It meant that, while it certainly negated most of his magic, he could still reach and manipulate it, if only a little. Over the time he had been imprisoned, he had worked on widening and strengthening his access to it, something he had more time to do now that he no longer received any visitors. 

For months after he had been dragged back to Asgard, Loki had put up with almost daily visits from Thor, his not-brother apologetic, earnest, honest - everything Loki hated from the person he hated the most. The only other visitor he had received was his mother. Frigga wouldn’t give up any more than Thor would, and he hated them both for it, and hated himself for hating it. In the end it was too much for him to bear, and he cast them both away, told them never to return, to leave him alone in his exile underground. It seemed that even being an apparent member of Asgardian royalty didn’t warrant Loki a cell away from the common rabble-rousers of the rest of society, but at least he had been given a cell to himself – he would have liked to have seen them try to make him share his space with even one other, let alone the two or three that usually ended up sharing the room. He had been given a few “luxuries”, a table and a small chair - not that he used the latter much, spending most of the time sitting on the floor, reading from the books he had managed to persuade Frigga to get him before he had grown weary of empty words and forbade her from visiting anymore - something about which he had no misgivings that Odin would be unhappy at his actions. Loki knew the All-father would not have been able to prevent Frigga from visiting him but he would also not have made it a secret that he disapproved of her actions.

All of which had combined to mean that Loki had spent many hours in the cell, alone but for his thoughts. At first the realisation had terrified him – he knew what was in there, the memories and thoughts better left well alone, locked away in so many parts of his mind that he was amazed he still had any ability to think coherently. He had tried so hard to keep memories hidden away, but it seemed that the more he tried to ignore certain things, the clearer they became.

During his time in New York he had learnt many things from touching on the mind of the man they called Hawkeye; personal things that interested him none but, aside of them, there was much information about the team that had faced up against him and contributed to his current situation. The Avengers, apparently; a group of grown adults acting as children, pretending they could save the day. None of them had been a real obstacle to him - bar the giant green monster that was an abomination to everything - though a couple had piqued his interest, and he let his thoughts wander a little on them. The woman they had, the Black Widow, was particularly interesting. He could see something dark in her that echoed in himself and Loki thought he would very much like to meet her under different circumstances. The other that had caught his eye was the one named Iron Man; a rather uninspired nickname, he thought, but the way he had spoken to Loki, all bravado and bluster and ego, had intrigued him and ignited a interesting spark inside him of almost familiarity and understanding. The man had to have been aware that he was facing someone much stronger and more powerful than him, yet he pushed himself forwards to meet with Loki head-on nonetheless - and the garish mechanical contraption that allowed him to fly was curious indeed...

There was something else about the encounter that he couldn’t quite get a hold on though. It was like having an annoying insect buzzing around inside his head; the moment he noticed it, the more irritating it became and the harder it was to see it. Curious - and with nothing better to do with his time - Loki decided to dig deeper into his memories; something he would usually avoid as much as possible, but he felt almost driven to do it. Settling down against the wall, back straight but muscles relaxed he closed his eyes, took a deep breath then exhaled slowly and focussed inwards, reaching down the corridors in his mind to bring up that incident once again and he let himself remember everything.

The man himself wasn’t tall, for a Midgardian, but his personality seemed to fill the space ten times over. Rather than the fear and chaos he usually encountered upon first meeting, the mortal seemed to treat him as an equal, acting indifferent at first then changing to brash and over-confident. Loki recalled watching the man slip bracelets over his hands to affix around his wrists, the gold slightly tarnished but still bright in places...

Loki suddenly snapped his eyes open as a shock ran through him. That was it; that was the memory that had been haunting him for all this time, always just out of reach, hiding in the shadows of his mind. Closing his eyes again he reached once more for that space inside him, and brought up as much as he could remember - why would a man in a metal suit with a bracelet affect him so - and who was the man? Loki thought of the information he had learnt from the Hawkeye and delved deep. He found it almost instantly: Anthony Stark, Tony to his friends...

For the second time in a row, Loki’s eyes shot open and he blinked in surprise as memories came rushing back to him, an assault of memories that he had stored away and forgotten for so many years that the realisation felt almost physical in nature - memories of an unexpected trip to Midgard before his true nature had been revealed, and an encounter with a boy who had surprised him with his openness and acceptance...

“ _I’m Tony_. Never _Anthony, ok?_ ”

He tried to find a reason to doubt it, but the more Loki thought about it the more certain he became. The man who had stood up to him in New York was the same boy who had sheltered him when he was injured all those years ago. The same boy who had had magic - that he had stolen his memories of.

Loki got to his feet in one fluid movement and began to pace almost absent-mindedly. He needed access to more power in order to get his magic back, and he now knew exactly how. If he could widen the hole in the net around him he would be able to access the interdimensional pocket he used to hold items of interest, and in there he had an artifact. A small stone, barely big enough to warrant mounting on a ring or choker, but one with magical properties that allowed a person to store energy within it, and to withdraw it at will. Once he had that in his grasp, he would be able to break free of the invisible chains that held him and allow him to make his next move - another visit to Midgard, this time on his own terms.

 

**Fall, 2013: New York, USA**

The workshop was loud, hot and in a state of chaos. Tony stood in one of the corners, bent over his most recent project, welding mask pushed up off his face and making his hair stick out at all angles. A bead of sweat rolled down his face, but he gave no sign that he felt it as he focused solely on his work. 

“Sir, I really think you should take a break now, or at least have something to drink. You’ve been working without either for longer than ten hours and you did ask me to remind you that you are still human and, as such, actually require food and water.” 

Tony looked up and blinked, a brief flash of confusion flickering on his face before he gave a wry grin. “Sorry J, got a bit distracted there. 

“Such an unusual occurrence as well.” 

“I bet no-one else gets talked back to by their own AI,” he replied, acting hurt. He swore he heard JARVIS sigh in resignation and couldn’t help letting out a snort of laughter. It felt like things were finally getting back to some semblance of normality after the almost-decimation of New York by aliens - and, of course, the almost-decimation of himself by way of a nuke in space... 

Tony still had trouble thinking about it, and the six months after the event were mostly a blur of half-formed memories to him. So much had changed - so much had needed to change - and he had done exactly what he shouldn’t have, by diving head first into a bottle and blocking everyone and everything out. He had been on track to finish what the nuke didn’t until Pepper somehow got through to him, managed to do what no-one else had, whilst still running his goddamn company AND overseeing the repair and renovation of Stark Tower. She had been a miracle worker, saving him... but not them. He couldn’t blame her; hell, he couldn’t even help himself, and it wasn’t hard to believe that Stark Industries would be around a lot longer than him. She needed stability, and a future that was as certain as possible - she deserve that, too. Not that it had been easy to deal with; his first instinct, of course, was to head straight back for the bottle and with anyone else he would’ve done, but he couldn’t do that to her. So he had gone back to his lab and just designed and built whatever he wanted, some ideas never getting off the drawing board but others blooming and growing into a whole array of things. Soon he noticed a pattern in what he was designing - pretty much every other item was something that could be of use to another member of the Avengers; collapsible shields, hi-tech arrows and, one of his favourite, a garroting wire hidden in a gold necklace. 

After that it was less than a month before every Avenger had their own space in the new, improved Avengers Tower - not that Tony had officially changed the name, but he and everyone pretty much exclusively referred to it as that by now. Clint and Natasha still had the claws of S.H.I.E.L.D in them though, and had been explicitly and very loudly by Fury that they were forbidden to move in - though Tony had still areas reserved for them which were used more often than he had thought they would be, and were there for that moment where they had no choice but to jump ship permanently. Bruce had been reluctant at first, but when Tony saw the spark in the man’s eyes as showed him the Hulk-proof floor he’d built in the remodelling and the high-rise R &D floors he knew Bruce had been convinced, and Steve... well, they’d all gone through a lot in that year and maybe he could learn to be a bit more accepting and understanding. And, to pretty much everyone’s amazement, it had worked. There had been a few teething troubles at first - mostly involving him and territory issues which had been expected - and after a few months a kind of domestic normality had settled. Two years after The Incident, and things were going better than Tony had ever thought possible. 

_Maybe it really was possible for someone to truly turn their life around for the better_ , he thought to himself with a wry smile as he took a long gulp from the large mug of coffee that just happened to be waiting in the machine for him - sometimes JARVIS scared him slightly - and winced as the hot liquid burned as it went down. 

“I believe it is customary to wait for the coffee to cool down enough to drink it...” 

“JARVIS, have you somehow secretly developed the ability to mind read?” Tony said as he scowled at the nearest visual sensor “I’m pretty sure that particular talent was never on the plan - at least, not one I included.” 

“Sadly not Sir,” the AI replied. “If I could I would be able to stop you going ahead with whatever crazy idea you come up with next _before_ you did it.” 

Tony let out a theatrical sigh of relief and headed back to his workbench, setting the mug of coffee down far enough away from the electronics as to not tempt fate. 

“You know, when I suggested a drink, I didn’t quite mean more caffeine...” 

"I know, I know,” Tony said, waving a hand. “But I’m so close to getting this project finished! I just need to work out how to- OW!” Tony shouted in surprise as a green spark shot from his hand and transferred to the circuit board he was working on. A jolt of pain shot through him and as he jumped back in surprise everything happened at once. 

Dum-E - who was always near Tony whenever he was in the workshop - began spinning round and round in circles, something he always did when Tony was hurt or angry or upset; U - who had been promoted to health and safety - whizzed across the floor as fast as was physically possible for him towards the first aid kit (that Pepper had forced him to get) and Butterfingers rolled straight up to Tony to stare at him with his camera lens - all while JARVIS tried to get the smaller bots under control while simultaneously trying to ascertain if Tony had actually injured himself. 

“STOP!” Tony’s voice rang clear in the room, and the bots all stopped freaking out at exactly the same time and turned to look at him questioningly while JARVIS sighed quietly in relief. “Guys, guys, it’s ok, I’m ok, no need to panic,” he said, holding his hands up. “See? No injury, nothing. A-OK!” Tony walked over to where Dum-E was still making panicky bleeping noises and he absently petted the bots mainframe, which he knew was kinda stupid but it always calmed it down so who was he to judge? Butterfingers and U rolled up to him cautiously and he petted them too - it didn’t do to show favoritism, he thought, and then he felt guilty. “I’d pet you to J, if I could!” 

“Thank you for your thoughtfulness, Sir,” JARVIS replied with less sarcasm than Tony expected, and not for the first time he felt truly grateful that he had the bots as company - ok, so he had made them, which was kinda creepy if you thought about it, but he didn’t so it was fine. And he felt less crazy talking aloud to his AI constructs than to himself, which was always a plus. 

Suddenly he remembered the cause of the commotion, and looked back towards the workbench where the circuit board still lay. There was no sign of smoke, so he assumed it was safe and he walked over to investigate. It seemed fine, but no harm in checking, he decided as he hooked it up to the virtual machine and fired up the screens, and he watched as the program booted. So far, so good. Tony watched as it ran to the point he had previously stalled on - and he frowned in confusion as the program not only kept running but seemed to have eradicated the problem he’d been working on. Staring at the screen a bit longer, he shook his head. 

“JARVIS, did we manage to untangle that bug we found in the processing code?” 

“No Sir,” the voice came back sounding as confused as Tony felt. “It was a particularly complex one that, by my calculation, should have taken at least a few more days work...” the AI trailed off. 

Tony gave an audible sigh and continued looking at the data in front of him. It wasn’t possible that the glitch had managed to self-repair and yet... and yet it had, he could see the proof in front of him. Except the proof was impossible. “I think I’m getting a headache,” Tony muttered to himself as he reached up to massage his temples before talking louder. “JARVIS? Can you run a full diagnostic from the bottom up? I’m going to go get some air...” 

“Of course Sir. Full diagnostic scan will take approximately one hour twenty-five minutes. Would you like me to alert you as to when the scan is complete?” 

"You know it!” Tony called back as he headed out the door of the workshop and headed towards the living area, thinking. Maybe he did need a break after all, a break from everything.


	5. Patience is a Virtue, to Those with Time

**Spring 2014 (Midgardian time); Prison wing, Asgard**

Loki had spent every waking minute working on widening the gap in the invisible net that cancelled out his magic. It consumed him from when he woke to when he passed out from exhaustion - and then it occupied his dreams as well. Every day he pushed his body and his mind to their limits, again and again and again, never giving up, until one day he realised that the last piece had fallen away.Carefully, to avoid drawing any unwanted attention, Loki closed his eyes and made a small gesture with his hands. There was a brief pause and for a moment he began to worry until he suddenly felt something give way as he connected to his magic, and the portal he had been trying to unlock. 

Keeping a calm face was proving more difficult than ever before - he wanted to drown himself in the feeling of being connected again, to use that power to crush and destroy everything and everyone he saw. It was like holding back a tidal wave in his mind, and it took all his strength to hold it back. _Not yet, not yet!_ he thought desperately at the oncoming storm, almost overwhelmed by the power trying to flow back into him again after so long without, like a man dying of thirst suddenly discovering a waterfall. When the chaos in his mind had quietened down enough, Loki reached into the pocket in space-time that he had opened and took out the stone. It felt light and cool in his hand, with no outward indication of it’s true nature, and as the opening closed with a brief flash of white light he held onto the stone and sent a small tendril of his magic into it. It was all he had at that moment, but it was enough - the stone recognised him, recognised his magic, and unlocked itself instantly. 

Magic flooded into Loki with unbridled fury and he laughed as the power swept through him, the torrent rushing through him making him feel more alive than he ever remembered - and now that his magic was no longer cut off from him, he had nothing holding him back. He shot a bolt of magic through the cell walls, and Loki grinned as all hell was let loose around him. The guards that ran in to see what all the commotion was about ended up dead and dying, bleeding out on the floor as a path of chaos and destruction was carved through them until daylight could be seen. Loki looked up at the sky in wonder at the sun that he hadn’t seen in so long, though he didn’t hesitate long - already he heard shouts in the distance of more guards coming to him; he had to leave, now. Wishing dearly that he could have had time to pay a visit to the All-father, Loki gave a small grin and in a flash of green fire he left the palace behind, teleporting himself to an area of the outlying wastelands that seemed so far back in his past that they belong to another life. Walking swiftly, he felt strangely anxious, but he needed to be certain. Soon he came to a familiar patch of bright _Arumia_ flowers and what looked like an entrance to a small cave beside it in a dip almost hidden from view. Loki stared at it for a moment, as he let himself become intrigued with the strange energy that was coming from it, and after a moment he smiled: it was exactly as he'd thought. Without a second glance back towards the palace, Loki stepped forwards into the darkness. 

__

For a split second it felt as if time stopped, and suddenly there was nothing beneath him. Creating a platform of magic under his feet, Loki felt himself drift towards the ground smoothly and took a moment to weave a distraction cloak around him - it wasn’t an invisibility shield, sadly, but it would mean that if anyone were to look in his direction their eyes would slide over and around without noticing him. It was one of the first spells he had mastered many years ago and had allowed him access to places, people and information that otherwise would have been denied to him which had been very useful at times. As he descended, Loki looked around he took in the scenery as a memory fired up in his mind, one that had sat in a deep, dark corner for many years. He frowned slightly as he reached solid ground, damp sand shifting slightly underneath his feet as he began walking, almost without thinking, towards a group of buildings nearby. The structures were barely standing, long since abandoned to the elements, windows broken and wooden frames ravaged by the salt air and ocean winds but despite the ravages of time on them they were as recognisable as they were almost thirty years ago. As Loki stepped through the door he brought a sphere of light to life, floating in the air just in front of him, casting a pale blue light that dimly picked out the items in the room. It seemed that nothing had changed, save for the layer of dust and sand on top of things, undisturbed for many years. 

Had Tony been back since that day, Loki wondered, and then scowled at the ridiculous notion that he could feel any kind of nostalgia, as if there was some kind of lingering feeling connecting him to that time. In the years since, he had done so much - seen so much - that a few days spent with a mortal boy before his life had changed for good couldn’t mean that much, surely. He walked through towards the old couch, torn, dusty and faded now, and sat down, feeling almost in a daze. Finally he had escaped the confines of Asgard, thrown off the chains that had held him back for so long. Now it was time to consider his next move. 

**Spring 2014; New York, USA**

Tony was not having a good day. Or a good week. Or a good month, really.

He prided himself on being a man of science, of working with facts and figures, for being able to back up what he said and believed with proof and reason. So when anything happened that he knew wasn’t possible it made him angry, and confused - but mostly angry.

“JARVIS, please tell me you have some kind of explanation?” Tony said imploringly, his voice strained as he stared at the screen blankly yet again.

“I’m sorry, Sir. Technically the resistor shouldn’t be able to deal with this amount of power but... well, it appears to be doing exactly that.”

Tony slumped in his seat and rested his arms on the desk, quickly followed by his head. “I don’t understand what’s going on J. I feel like I’ve ended up in an alternate reality where up is down and I don’t know how to deal with it.”

“Maybe a break from the lab would be advisable.”

“But I don’t _want_ a break from the lab,” Tony replied petulantly, aware that he sounded like a spoilt kid and not caring one bit. This was his space, his domain, somewhere he always knew he could escape to, to relax and focus and generally shut out everything and everyone else. If he lost this... He swore loudly as he threw the stylus pen he’d been holding across the room then sighed. “What’s the time?”

“01:35am, Sir.”

“Oops,” Tony muttered under his breath, then sighed. “Well, it’s technically still night time, so I can technically still have a drink. I’ll be up in the bar.” Tony got to his feet with a sigh and headed off to the lounge. At least no-one would be awake at this time for him to disturb - or to disturb him, he thought guiltily as he stepped out the elevator and headed to the bar. It had been a long time since he had been able to even walk into this room, after it happened. He had battled nightmares for weeks afterwards, of free-falling through the air, unable to stop himself as he hurtled to his death. In his dreams he was never saved - the suit didn’t come; the Hulk wasn’t there, a million other variables - and he just fell and fell until JARVIS woke him, the AIs voice bleeding into his dreams from outside. He was glad Pepper wasn’t with him then; he was glad no-one was with him then. Those days had been dark and endless, and the nights even more so. 

That he was still alive was of more shock to him that anyone else - he hadn’t actively been trying to kill himself but he had been so desperate for it all to stop, to find an end to it somehow, that if it had come down to that he wasn’t sure he would have been able to stop it. Thankfully Pepper had stepped in, pulled him back from the precipice and talked him down. Now, although he still drank he didn’t do it to forget, and he didn’t do it in anger of self-hatred. Usually he drank to think and consider and plan - which he did now as he fixed a dry martini at the renovated bar, the chrome sparkling against the deep red of the leather upholstery. Tony had wanted to remodel the chrome in gold plating to match the suit but Pepper had forbidden him, which had made him sulk for days. 

He sat at the large window and looked out over Manhattan at night. The city was beautiful, though it always made him feel so alone up in his tower, unreachable and small. He shook his head ruefully and downed the rest of the drink as he tried to shake off the encroaching feeling that something was coming - and that something wasn’t good. “JARVIS, change of plan - I’m taking the suit out for a drive. Somewhere.” He grinned in spite of himself. “You’ll probably find out where as soon as I do.”

He could’ve sworn he heard a sigh in reply.

...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the kudos' and comments so far! Just to let you know that this fic will be on a short hiatus thanks to RL getting in the way, but I'm hoping to have a new chapter up ASAP.


	6. Chapter 6

The next day started out overcast, the heavy dark clouds in the distance over the city promising rain later in the day - which suited Tony’s mood fine. He sighed as he got out of bed, yawned loudly and began his regular set of stretches, grunting when he felt a muscle pull here or a tendon there. This getting older thing was really quite inconvenient, and while his suit protected him from the worst of any scrapes he got into,there was still only so much it could do, and his body usually sported a few impressive bruises at any given time.

"Is everything alright Sir?" JARVIS asked as he straightened up, and Tony grunted noncommittedly. 

"As much as can be expected," he replied as he headed off to the bathroom, grabbing a towel from the shelf outside the door. "I'm having a day off today J. Need to clear my head a bit. Maybe I'll take out the suit to test the new guidance mods in this storm that’s brewing." There might have been a reply, but his mind was already thinking about his upcoming flight as he shed the t-shirt and shorts he'd been wearing and stepped into the shower - which had already been running long enough to reach the perfect temperature, thanks to JARVIS. As the warm water hit his skin, Tony began to relax - he hadn't had the chance for a joyride in what felt like forever, and recent events had made him feel more on edge than usual, and there was nothing to do that couldn’t wait until tomorrow.

...

Tony dipped down towards the water, the midday sun glinting off the surface of the water, then pulled up sharply just a hair's breadth from the surface, and as he watched the scenery fly past he began to think about his current situation and life in general. Usually it was a subject he stayed well clear of but being out here alone - well, alone but for JARVIS on comms - made him feel unusually reflective. His thoughts drifted on to his parents, what his life would be like now if they were still alive, if he hadn't been so suddenly alone and left in the care of a man he thought of as family - only to have that same man try to kill him for the company he'd inherited from his father. The whole thing was so ironic, considering at the time he wasn't really all that interested in Stark Industries. Obie's defection had ignited a drive in him that he couldn't remember ever having for anything before - other than alcohol. He thought Howard would be proud of him now, or at least mildly approving. He hoped.

It seemed that his reminiscing had influenced his choice of destination as he noticed the coordinates for the family home come up on the HUD. With a snort of wry laughter he chose a suitable landing place and began to swoop down towards a clearing near to the house. Tony didn't really have any desire to get too close to the house - or the people who now inhabited it - but there was somewhere else he realised that he did want to visit. Thoughts of his parents had thankfully brought up happier memories, of hours spent in his self-styled hideout, working on his own projects or just tinkering with the bits and pieces he'd managed to find, collect or "permanently borrow" from Howard. As Tony approached the run-down building he felt a strange sense of peace - this was probably the only place from his childhood for which he had only positive memories, and he allowed himself a small smile as he flipped open the visor and walked up to the door, reaching out to open it. He wasn't surprised to find it unlocked - no-one else had ever found this place so he had gotten out of the habit of locking it. The door opened with a slight squeak, which wasn't unusual, and as he opened the door Tony inhaled deeply, the smell of wood and dust and...

Suddenly he felt himself being picked up by an invisible force and thrown across the room. Even with the suit the impact of the blow knocked the wind out of him as he hit a wall. The impact managed to dislodge the rest of the faceplate of his suit, and Tony hastily gasped in a few lungfuls of air as soon as he was able to, as he tried to clear his vision of the black dots dancing in front of his eyes. When he succeeded, he thought he must be hallucinating as his assailant came into view.

"Such a letdown, to see such potential reduced to this."

"What the... Loki? Wait - didn't Thor banish your pretty, homicidal self to the depths of Asgard?" Tony tried to keep his voice light, but inside his head his mind was in overdrive. Was is really Loki - and, if so, how the hell had he managed to get here? And, possibly more important, why?

“You really believe my brother able to keep me where I do not wish to be?” Loki said, a small smile on his face as he walked closer to Tony. “Thor isn’t quite as clever as he would like to believe.” 

“Not as clever as you, you mean?” Tony said, raising a single eyebrow in defiance, his voice as level as he could make it with his entire vision filled with Loki and still unable to move. Stalling was pretty much the only option at the moment, as he realised with a start that his contact with JARVIS was also shielded from him by this invisible force. He just needed some time to think...

“And they call me Silver-tongue,” Loki said with a small smile on his face, suddenly less manic and more amused as he reached up to touch the side of his face softly, almost reverently. “Yes, I can see the attraction. Such strength of character even then.” His face fell as he spoke almost regretfully, “Such a shame I couldn’t keep you.”

Tony tried not to let his thoughts show, especially the thoughts that were along the lines of ‘what the hell is this crazy-ass space god on about?’ He watched as Loki turned away from him and started pacing around the room, muttering to himself, his hands waving in the air as if in conversation, and he sighed. Not only had he managed to get himself captured, he’d managed to get captured by one of the very few living things that could possibly do harm to him, and wouldn’t think twice about doing so. This week was just getting better and better.

“So, uh... where do we go from now? I mean, I usually have to at least buy someone a drink before I find myself tied up, so I’m a bit off my game at the moment but if you have any suggestions I’m- _mmmpfh!_ ”

“You are definitely much more tolerable when your mouth can’t open,” Loki said almost absently as he looked over from where he was standing. “And what is so wonderful about a gag made of air is that it allows the person to breathe normally while they are wearing it, so it can be kept on for extended periods of time. Quite... markedly extended.” Loki gave a soft laugh at the look of horror on Tony’s face and then sighed. “I suppose I should really let you know that I don’t intend any harm to come to you, Stark. In fact, I intend quite the opposite. You possess something, a gift, that you are entirely ignorant of. I intend to reveal it to you - and assist you, of course.” 

After a few moments of mumbling against the invisible gag, Tony was relieved to feel it disappear. Working some moisture into his mouth, he cleared his throat before speaking. “What the hell are you on about? How could you be able to help me with something I don’t even know about? That makes no sense!” The man was more than crazy, and Tony was quite sure he’d end up the same if he tried to work out what the hell Loki was talking about.

“Shh - it will all become clear very soon. I will open your mind, and restore your memories. I will fix what I did wrong, this time.” Loki’s voice had taken on that manic tone again, speaking a little too quickly, pitch a little too high, and Tony swallowed dryly as he saw Loki smile, the light in his eyes glittering too brightly before starting across the floor towards him. 

“This. This is what I stole from you. And this is what I return - my gift to you.”

Tony didn’t get a chance to reply before Loki placed hands on either side of his head. For a moment, the world seemed to stand still, to pause balanced on a knife edge and he thought he felt his heart stop as everything went black...

And then Tony felt himself lean forwards and fall into the beckoning abyss.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your patience ^_^


	7. Not missing, just misplaced

_It’s like he’s there, but not, looking down on himself at fifteen. He’s sitting in his room as he listens to his parents arguing, their voices drifting up through two floors, the barriers failing to mute their voices enough for him to avoid hearing what they were arguing about. He tries to ignore it every time he heard his name mentioned; shouted in drunken anger by his father, spoken in desperate pleas by his mother. He feels the shame all over again, closely followed by anger and a wave of loneliness. This he remembers._

 

Then he’s in his hideout by the beach, and he feels something tug at the back of his mind, but he ignores it. This is his safety net, his escape. His chance to be alone - except he’s not. Someone is with him, in his space, and it feels  right.  His shadow bleeds a presence of green-and-gold, and they work together, achieving things no ordinary man could even dream about. He feels content, understood, and or the first time in his life, he feels that someone truly accepts him. This is what life is meant to feel like.

 

And then his shadow rips his memories from him, stolen like a thief in the night, and is gone.

 

.

 

It took a moment for Tony to remember who - and where - he was. The thick tendrils of long-lost memories stuck to him, threatening to pull him under again, and it was only with effort that made both his mind and his body scream in pain that he managed to bring himself wholly back to the present. He found himself on one knee, the suit allowing movement now it had lost connection with JARVIS and the mainframe back in the Tower, and Tony blinked as his senses came rushing back. He felt hyper-aware of everything - each drop of sweat running down his neck, the feel of the suit around every part of his body, the sound of his breathing, harsh and quick to his ears, and the sound of someone else nearby. In an instant he was primed for fight-or-flight, his mind racing ahead even before he was even sure of where he was.

 

"Isn't it beautiful?"

 

Tony heard the other person speak, voice soft and unthreatening, but the voice made him look up instinctively and his eyes widened.

 

"Loki! What... what did you do to me?" His voice seemed too loud to him and he flinched at the sound, closing his eyes against the onslaught of noise and too-bright colours that threatened to overwhelm him again.

 

"Done?" The voice was soft again. "All I have done is returned your lost memories, your true memories." Tony heard soft footfalls approaching him, but he didn't - couldn't - move. Steeling himself for whatever was coming next, he felt himself flinch slightly as Loki knelt down next to him, looking into his eyes with an expression of what looked strangely like concern... and guilt? Just the thought of that made Tony snort softly in amusement, and he saw Loki's expression change to one of steely defensiveness.  "Do you not appreciate my gift, mortal?"

 

Tony said nothing for a moment, letting himself thinking before opening his mouth -  _wouldn't Pepper be impressed with me now,_ he thought with wry amusement- and tried to moderate his language.

 

"Well, let me see; so far you've escaped from alien jail, zapped yourself back here, attacked me, disabled my suit - after I've  _just_ finished the new modifications on it, I might add - and now I feel like I've taken a triple hit of high-grade acid. Forgive me if I can't quite see the gift in all of this right now!"

 

There was a brief pause, and suddenly his own words came back on him. Swearing silently, he closed his eyes and mentally prepared himself for his imminent death - which, when it didn't come, made him open one eye cautiously to find out what was going on.  Loki was looking at him almost thoughtfully.

 

"Tell me, Stark - have you noticed anything...  _unusual_ recently?"

 

"You mean other than this?" Tony quipped back, waving a hand to vaguely cover them both.

Loki rolled his eyes and bit back a sigh.

 

"I mean, anything that seems to defy your natural laws of being - gravity being reversed, for instance, or things working in a way they should not."

 

Tony was about to reply something along the lines of 'sounds like a normal day to me', but just as he opened his mouth, a thought occurred to him.

 

_The incidents in the lab - circuits working that shouldn't have been able to, code debugging itself, diagnostics reports that he was convinced were false because there was no way an error could rectify itself..._

 

"I see this has sparked some recognition. Good. I suspected this might happen, and it is just as well that I found you when I did."

 

"Suspected that what might happen? What the hell is going on? All I've had so far is a head full of memories that are me, but also aren't, that I lived through but don't remember, and the only thing that seems to be any kind of constant is  _you._ And forgive me if this sounds rude, but that fact in itself makes me rather suspicious of, well, everything."

 

Loki stood up and, as he did so, guided Tony to his feet with a hand under his chin. The suit fell away from him like petals from a dying flower, the last bonds holding it together broken easily by Loki's touch, and Tony felt like his entire  _skin_ had been peeled away, leaving his insides open and vulnerable. He tried not to think, tried to ignore memories that still kept filling his head, like missing pieces of a jigsaw fitting into place that he hadn't known were missing in the first place. His brain seemed somehow too big for his skull, the pressure becoming almost unbearable to the point Tony was sure his head would split open. Reaching up, he pressed a palm to the side of his head and took a deep breath as he looked up and saw Loki smiling as he spoke softly.

 

"Your magic has returned, Tony."

 

 


	8. Revelations

Tony didn’t stop to think.

The anger and fear and confusion he felt was so strong that all rational thought had fled. Unencumbered by the suit, he lunged forward, hands reaching out towards Loki, satisfied to see those brilliant green eyes widen briefly in surprise before they vanished a fraction of a second before his fingers grasped nothing but thin air.. Stumbling slightly and off balance from his foiled attack, Tony would have fallen but for an arm that reached out to him, slender fingers wrapping tightly around his elbow which allowed him time to find his feet. His breath still came fast and shallow with adrenaline pumping through his system and he looked up at Loki, who was looking at him with an expression that looked almost sympathetic.

“I understand. It can be... disorientating to have such memories returned”. Loki said softly, his hand still on Tony’s elbow, though now with a softer grip.

Tony stood up straight, his body calming down from the fight-or-flight reflex though still on alert. Just because Loki hadn’t attacked him yet didn’t mean he wouldn’t. Taking a step back to give himself some space, Tony suddenly had a thought.

“So, why now? I mean, you said my... whatever... was starting to come out anyway - which, I have to be honest, at least gives me a reason for the screwy things that’ve been happening recently - but why now?” 

Loki gave a small smile. “You didn’t think your journey through the wormhole would leave you untouched, did you?”

“I know it didn’t leave me untouched, because I lost Pepper, almost lost my company and near drank myself to death thanks to the side effects of unexpected inter-dimensional travel with a damn nuke for company - and now you’re telling me it kicked all of this off too? Fuck, I need a drink... why am I not at home?” 

“You wish to be in your tower?” 

“Of course I do!” Tony replied, not caring that he was shouting anymore - the area was mostly deserted now and, besides, it made him feel better.

“Very well,” Loki replied, and before Tony had a chance to ask what the god meant by that, Loki stepped up, placed his hands on Tony’s shoulders, and suddenly everything went fuzzy.

 

When Tony felt a solid foundation underneath him again, he fell to his knees. He felt disorientated and slightly wrong, though he was brought round by a familiar voice.

“Sir? Are you well? How did you get here? Do you know that one of SHIELD’s Most Wanted is standing next to you? Shall I engage Protocol 666?”

“Yes, no idea, yes again and no. In that order. Hi JARVIS.” Tony was still kneeling on the tiled floor of his upper observation deck, trying to get his brain to stop feeling like it was about to explode. “I think I might’ve broken my head though...”

“Teleportation can do that to a mortal - the first few times, anyway. I suspect that you won’t be as affected though, what with your re-awakened Talent.” Loki was peering at the ceiling, trying to work out where the voice was coming from. It always unnerved people, the first time they heard JARVIS - especially when the ‘voice in the ceiling’ followed them from room to room - and Tony had a terrible penchant for pranking people who didn’t realise that his AI also had sensors in the bathroom. He was very proud when he found out that JARVIS had started doing it without Tony’s instruction, for his own amusement.

“I think I’m going to be sick,” Tony managed to mumble before he passed out.

...

Waking up in strange places with a headache really should’ve been something Tony had left behind in his twenties. With a small groan he tried to move, and wondered why his bed felt so hard. Suddenly, he realised that it wasn’t his bed he was lying on, but the old battered couch in his workshop. He sat bolt upright, and the nausea hit at the same time as he saw Loki standing across from him, leaning casually on one of his workstations, a StarkPad in his hands. 

“You have some interesting ideas on this, though I have seen flaws of design and creation in them. However, I am also sure than many of these can be overcome now, once I teach you how.” Loki said as he walked over to the window on the far side of the room. “So high up here... It is as if living in the clouds, looking down on the world.” He paused and gave a small smile. “Like living as a god.” 

“I’m not living like a god,” Tony muttered as he got to his feet and scowled. “I just don’t like being near other people.”

Loki gave a short laugh, and the sound made Tony jump. “I suspect you find other humans as boring and closed-minded as I. All wrapped up in their tiny worlds, unaware of anything past the end of their nose, content to have the same routine all day every day.”

“They have a few good points,” Tony said, slightly evading the statement. Agreeing too closely with Loki would probably end up creating a very slippery slope, one from which there might not be an easy return.

“Do inform me, please,” Loki drawled, leaning back against the window as he crossed his arms across his chest and waited. 

Tony hesitated, then shrugged. “Sex is pretty awesome. And food. Food is pretty awesome too.”

Loki raised an eyebrow in question, and Tony felt the corners of his mouth twitching in response. It was perhaps one of the most honest conversations he’d had with anyone recently, which was both refreshing and rather discomfiting. To shake that thought from his mind, Tony stood up and stretched before making his way to the nearest workstation where he booted up the system.

“Come on then,” he said, a note of challenge in his voice as his systems sparked into life around him. “Show me what I can do.”


	9. With great power comes great responsibility. Sometimes...

Loki had less than a second’s warning before the area he had been occupying was suddenly filled with a flash of light so bright it seemed to hand in the air, along with the smoke that accompanied the explosion. He looked across the room from his new vantage point to where Tony was standing behind a workbench, tendrils of smoke still curling lazily towards the ceiling.

“Umm... oops?” Tony said quickly, trying hard to hide the grin threatening to break out.

“I swear to the norns, if I thought you were actually trying to harm me on purpose I would put a stop to all of this - but I honestly think you are just too stupid for that.”

“Hey!” Tony protested. “It’s not my fault you’re a lousy teacher! I’ve spent days trying to work out what the hell is going on with everything with everything I’ve ever known being turned upside down. And anyways, you orchestrated this whole ridiculous venture - of which I still know nothing about, by the way - so maybe it’s time you put your money where your mouth is!”

Loki hesitated for a moment, and a look of confusion flashed across his face for a moment before he regained his composure. “I neither possess nor have need or your quaint monetary system, and I don’t understand how it would help the situation even if I did.”

Tony stared at the god for a second, then blinked and shook his head. “For the... Never mind, it was just a saying. Ignore it. But I still say that it would make things a hell of a lot easier if I had some guidance or suggestions. I mean, this is the coolest thing I’ve ever done, and I’ve done a lot of cool things, but I’m the first one to put my hand up and say maybe it isn’t a great idea to just let me loose with shit - I’m not exactly the most level-headed and well-balanced of people, you know...” He trailed off as he remembered who he was talking to. An alien space-god who tried to enslave the world. Well.

“It is often those of us who are seen as so that end up having the boldest ideas,” Loki replied quietly as he made his way back across the room, his gaze focused out of the window behind Tony. “Most others are just too dull to see it.”

Privately, Tony agreed with the sentiment, a little. He voiced nothing of it. “Maybe you’re right, maybe you’re not. But I still say if I had an idea of how to work this stuff it would produce better results. I mean, I don’t really want to be wingman to another world domination attempt but I think we could do some cool stuff. You could start by teaching me how to do that nifty teleportation trick you just pulled to get out the way - I can imagine the look on Cap’s face when I pull that one off in front of him!”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Loki scoffed, “The dynamics and understanding of magical teleportation are not only complex but also something revealed only to those who have consistently shown a high level of talent in that area. It’s not some parlour-trick to amuse and entertain!”

Tony was muttering to himself as Loki spoke, and shook his head slightly as he pushed and poked at a pen on the desk in front of him. “Oh, I don’t know, it doesn’t seem that difficult... you just need to apply basic physics and mathematical thinking to the ideas of quantum physics viewed from a magical perspective, and then just let them all just believe that they’re all _meant_ to be there and _meant_ to do that and...” The pen in front of Tony shuddered and shimmered in the air before disappearing entirely and reappearing on the desk six inches to the left of it’s original position. Tony looked at it then grinned. “See?”

Loki didn’t get flustered easily - it seemed pretty much a redundant trait to for a god of lies - but for the first time in as long as he could remember, he was speechless. He could remember the amount of time and effort he had put into understanding the mechanics of teleportation and transmogrification, how even then it had taken hours of studying before he even attempted to move his object - a small ring with a bright emerald stone set in it, a present from Frigga. Loki remembered the feeling of amazement and satisfaction after managing that first step... He looked up and saw Tony looking at him, hesitation mixed with excitement plain on his face. 

“Well then. It seems you are progressing further than I expected. However, I would prefer if you did not attempt that again, whether in my company or not. It only takes being slightly out in your calculations to cause disaster. Did you consider _where_ the object being transported goes to in that split second of non-existence? An object much still exist somewhere in space-time. If you accidentally shift an object into the middle of a black hole them bring it back into this plane of existence...” Loki gave an involuntary shudder. “Well. Let’s just say that it is very, very messy.”

As Loki gave his explanation Tony could feel his face getting paler and paler. “Oh. Umm...” His voice got a little steadier as he inhaled sharply. “Well, that just goes to show that I really was right when I said I shouldn’t be trusted to stumble my way around this shit. I’ve already experienced going through a wormhole, don’t really wanna add a black hole to my Bucket List.”

“I have no idea what a Bucket List is, but I will agree that it’s not something anyone should desire to experience. It is rare that any living thing survives such a happening and, if they do, they come out... wrong.” Loki seemed to almost be talking to himself as he spoke, a distant look on his face. “No sentient being should ever live through that.”

Tony sensed there was more to Loki’s tale than just what he had been given but he wasn’t going to ask for more. They had fallen into a strange kind of companionship since the revelation of his new-found talents and he understood that they both had their fair share of secrets. It was, he thought, only natural - though he felt rather strange that he accepted it without any difficulty.

“So then, what’s next?” Tony realised his voice was louder and slightly higher than usual, but hoped his discomfort wasn’t too obvious.

“Next? Next you get some rest and food - mortals are decidedly useless without either unfortunately and I would so hate for you to make a mistake due to a lack of either and end up disintegrating yourself or ending up on another plane of existence or other such happenings. And I am going to go elsewhere for a short time - but do not fear, I shall be back soon.” Then, without further warning, Loki shimmered once then disappeared in front of his eyes.

“Oh goody,” Tony muttered under his breath then sighed loudly. “But yes, food. Food would be good. JARVIS?”

“Oven already up to temperature and your food is prepared and ready to go in. Though there’s not really much else for me to do when the food in question is leftovers from last night’s takeout delivery...”

Tony smiled at his AI’s obvious disdain for his choice of meal and headed out of the lab towards the main kitchen, and as he did reached the doors he heard JARVIS speak again.

“Sir, are you _sure_ you don’t want to initiate protocol 666?”

He just laughed and shook his head, and tried to convince himself that he had nothing more on his mind than the thought of the finest Italian food to be found in New York.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to all the reads, kudos' and comments - and, most of all, thanks for sticking with this story.


	10. There is no ending but the end

Loki existed within the fold between time and space. He wasn’t here, but he also wasn’t there.

It was an alluring place to be, in that transitory stage of being and not-being, and there was always a tug that he felt inside of him to stay here. _Don’t go_ , it said. _Stay here, with us. Just be._

The temptation always pulled at a part of him that Loki hated to acknowledge. He wasn’t weak, he didn’t fall prey to the cheap tricks and illusions that enslaved lesser beings. He had the blood of royalty running through his veins, and that proved he was bound for greater things.

Didn’t it?

The incessant cloud of self-doubt hung over him like a rock.

Loki didn’t make _mistakes _. True, occasionally things didn’t quite turn out the way he had expected, but there was always a reason for his actions - and if those reasons were purely self-centered, well, at least that was a reason. He kept reminding himself of this as he tried to unravel the knotted ball of chaos in his head that was Tony Stark. Why had the man come back into his life now? What was the reason? What was he meant to take from it? At first, he had thought of nothing more than to enslave him, somehow, and use his energy and magic to further his own goals, but having watched the man take to magic so easily had stirred up something inside him that he thought he no longer possessed.__

__Hope._ _

__It was a foolish notion, he scolded himself. Hope lead only to weakness and pain, he knew that. He’d _lived_ that. And yet, there is was, small and weak but impossible to ignore, and it fed the fires of memories long-forgotten, of when he hadn’t equated hope with fear, and when he met the first being to ever resonate within him so deeply..._ _

__The anger and frustration and self-doubt grew heavy so quickly that it overwhelmed him, and in that moment he knew that the ties that bound his soul so tightly inside him had started to fray._ _

__..._ _

__Tony was standing in the middle of the lounge looking suspiciously at the rather unappetising-looking smoothie in his hand when Loki re-appeared, quite literally, from nowhere - the result of which caused the aforementioned drink to end up on the pale beige carpet and a rather high pitched shriek that honestly, _totally_ , didn’t come from Tony. Maybe._ _

__“Fuck me!”, Tony gasped as he tried to get his heart rate back to normal. “I need to tie goddamn bells to you or something! Or some kind of inter-dimensional horn...” He trailed off mid-sentence as his brain provided him with a rather amusing mental image involving a bicycle bell attached to one of Loki’s helmet-horns.  
Loki, meanwhile, just stared at him for a moment then raised a single eyebrow. “But then that would take all the fun out of it,” he replied, and Tony wondered if he was imagining things when he saw the faint twitch of a smile appear. _ _

__“Do you have a reason for trying to kill me, or do you just like hearing me scream?”_ _

__“Well - I can’t say I’m opposed to the latter, but I do have a rather more pressing matter in mind.” Loki strode across the floor like he owned it, all feline grace and power, and ended up in front of Tony. He looked up and made sure he had all the attention and a slow smile spread across his face._ _

__“So - you want to learn magic?”_ _

__..._ _

__For the first time in the last few months, Tony wondered if he had made the right decision._ _

__Ok, so he wasn’t exactly the King of Good Choices, but this was the cherry on the top of it all. He was so used to being at the top of the pile, the Apex Predator, the person that everyone else looked up to._ _

__And now he was starting to learn that he wasn’t even close._ _

__Loki wasn’t an unfair tutor - even he could grudgingly accept that - but it still smarted to have someone show him things that he didn’t already know. Even if those things weren’t technically viable on his place of existence..._ _

__Oh well._ _

__Tony was focused on a particularly difficult working when he felt a presence behind him. Ignoring the hairs standing up on the back of his head he carried on with his work and he managed to do so until a hand came from behind him to lay over the top of his own._ _

__“Mixing those two elements would cause an inter-dimensional incident that even _I_ would have difficulty controlling.”_ _

__Tony inhaled sharply at the closeness of the breath that carried those words. Forcing himself to stay facing the opposite way, he kept focussed on the bench in front of him. “See, this is why I need someone to teach me. Because we really don’t need another tear in space-time around here - well, I don’t, at least.”_ _

__Sometimes he really wished someone would shut his mouth for him._ _

__However, instead of rising to the bait, Loki moved to stand behind Tony, and let his hands trace over the electrical components in front of him, their arms almost touching. “So primitive, so basic, and yet... so powerful...”_ _

__By this point, Tony was totally and utterly confused. Turning to face the demigod next to him, he opened his mouth - and quickly felt a hand covering it before he could say a word._ _

__“You know, you are far more agreeable when you can’t speak”, Loki said with amusement as he stepped closer behind Tony, his chin at the same level as the top of the man’s head. What he lacked in strength and bulk, Loki knew he made up for in speed and cunning - and privately he admitted that he knew he was closely matched in both of these in his current situation. It was possibly this knowledge that let him break through that barrier; the one he had kept up between his brother, his father - his not father - and even Frigga...._ _

__He was ready to do what he wanted to do._ _


End file.
